“Didn’t notice much last night, huh?” I asked, grabbing my phone and keys.
“We were too busy noticing other things last night,” the second girl giggled. “Like the size of your cock.” Giggles all around.
I nodded. “Well, make yourselves at home,” I said, heading for the door.
“We’ll be here waiting when you get home!” the first girl called. Again, no clue what her name was. She did have an amazing set of tits and the tighter pussy of the two, but I digress.
Babe, I’ll never see you again...
Pauline would see to that. She’d be here within two minutes after I left and would chase both of them out with a shotgun if she had to. Another bonus for Pauline.
* * *
I rode the private elevator down in silence, briefly checking my messages as they came in one after the other over my phone, already clouding my head with crap I would have to deal with before the day was out.
I tucked the phone inside my jacket, walked across the lavishly furnished lobby, and waited as my car pulled up to the curb. The back door opened, and Alice gazed at me from over her horn-rimmed glasses, a scowl on her face that left unattractive lines etched on her forehead.
“We’re going to be late,” she announced as I slid into the backseat, closing the door behind me.
“Good morning to you, too, Alice,” I greeted.
“You have a meeting in ten minutes,” Alice said, ignoring the tired smile on my face. “Dennis has been planning this meeting for weeks. The least you can do is show up on time.”
“Alice, sweetheart, I pay you to keep my life organized, not to give me advice,” I replied. “Or to chastise me. I’m pretty sure I pay other people to do that.”
Alice grunted, and I couldn’t help but smile. Ever since I had hired her as my personal assistant slash wrangler, I had definitely upped my game. I didn’t have to worry about incompetence anymore, and since Alice enjoyed pussy as much as I did, I didn’t have to deal with office drama, either. She was the perfect fit for me, and she knew it just as much as I did. Which made her one smug bitch.
My kind of girl.
“Okay, Miles,” I called out to my driver. “Get us to the office, pronto, before Alice here rips us both a new one.”
“With pleasure, sir,” Miles replied, giving me a knowing smile in the rear view mirror. “And may I say, you look exceptionally well today, Mr. Ridder.”
“I feel like crap, Miles, but thank you.”
“You’re quite welcome, sir,” he said as the car pulled into the morning traffic to head downtown. “Just doing my job.”
* * *
“As you can see, investing in this would put Ridder Technology at the forefront of the game.”
I was slumped in my seat fiddling with my phone, barely listening to the pitch Dennis had lined up for me. When you’re a rich and famous entrepreneur like yours truly, people come out of the woodwork to pitch you all kinds of business ideas… the next big thing… nothing like it on the market… the greatest invention since sliced bread. At least that’s what everyone claims. Some of the ideas are truly crazy, some are not, most would lose rather than make money. I get pitched everywhere I go: at the office, at social events, on the golf course, in the men’s room at a strip club; even at the fucking Astros games standing in line to buy a freakin’ hot dog.
This pitch was no different. I just wasn’t standing at a urinal with my cock in my hand. The kid standing across the conference room looked like he had just come out of high school, nervous voice cracking, zits and all. The suit he was wearing was a size or two larger than his frame, his glasses kept slipping down his nose, and he fumbled along his presentation as if he were asking a girl out for the first time.
I was already bored to tears.
“What do you think, Chance?”
I looked up and lifted an eyebrow at the man sitting to my right. Dennis East was my best friend and right-hand man, and the one person on the planet that I truly trusted. Ever since freshman year at college, we had been stuck to each other’s sides like ticks on a blue hound. I had started my company with the little bit of inheritance my good-for-nothing old man had left me when he finally choked and died, and building it up to the billion-dollar tech conglomerate that it was now had been a real challenge. A challenge I could not have overcome without the help of Dennis.
He was as ruthless as I was, his charming smile hiding the true tiger that hid behind it. He could compliment a man one minute, then tear off his head in the next. If there was one person I knew who could run my company as well as I could, it was Dennis. That was a thought that gave me both comfort and pause. Sometimes, Dennis acted like he did run the place. I’d have to gently nudge him back into the second chair to get us back on track.
That made me wonder why the hell he was wasting my time with this crap. I had no idea what this kid was pitching, but it wasn’t something I was the least bit interested in. Dennis knew it, so why was he wasting my time?
“I’m not really sure what Poindexter is pitching,” I said with a long sigh. “Hell, I’m not sure he knows what he’s talking about.”
Dennis shot me a glare, his signature “play nice” look that I was slowly getting tired of, especially when he set up useless meetings like these.